IRELAND: Birdwatch Ireland has moved to allay public fears of wild birds contaminating Ireland with avian flu, following a spate of new cases of the disease in Austria, Germany and possibly Denmark.
Spokesman Niall Hatch said that while it is "a real but small risk" that migrating birds could transport the disease in to the country, the vast majority of birds visiting Ireland in winter "travel west to east, from places such as Greenland and Canada", which are areas unaffected by the disease.
In conjunction with the Departments of Agriculture and Environment, Birdwatch Ireland is "carefully monitoring" bird habitats such as the Booterstown marsh. However, "the real threat is the movement of poultry and caged birds" as "evidenced by the sporadic outbreaks of the infection in places such as Nigeria".
Saying that "there has not been a human-to-human case of the illness so far", Mr Hatch added that suggestions of draining wetlands or culling birds were "misguided". Such an act would have a negative effect in that it would encourage birds to go elsewhere - thus acting as a catalyst to spreading the disease.